NOM

Here's something I found interesting that I thought I'd pass along.

Darrel Ray is an organizational psychologist who did an intensive study of the relationships between sex, guilt, and religion. Here's a graph he created from polls of 14,000 people, both religious and non-religious, that shows how many people by their own admission had engaged in various sexual acts by age 21 (left). The results are almost exactly the same for both groups. He also included questions about ongoing masturbation and pornography use (not graphed here). Again, the results were the same except that religious people use 5-10% MORE pornography and it increases as they grow older. He pointed out that the two states with the highest pornography use are Utah and Mississippi.



Ray detected two major differences between religious and non-religious people. First is the massive guilt burden carried by religious people (right) despite the fact that they continued to perform sexual acts that they found guilt-inducing (notice who scored highest!) Second is that religious people consistently lie about their sexual activities. In an interview in Richard Dawkins' Sex, Death and the Meaning of Life, Ray says that when he addresses non-religious audiences and asks "by the raise of hands, how many of you masturbate?" 80-90% of the people in the room raise a hand, but when he addresses a religious group and asks the same question NO hands go up. His conclusion, considering that the anonymous poll results are the same for both groups, is that religion really has no actual influence on sexual behavior, despite all of the preaching and condemning that goes on, except that it teaches people to lie about it.

Thoughts?

Great post! I think this makes a lot of sense and I've often wondered if the hammering of chastity and guilt at a young age through to adulthood really makes a difference. From my own personal experience and those I know, this survey is quite accurate.

I am reminded of a quote attributed to Vaughn Featherstone. "There are 2 types of young men: those that masterbate, and those that lie about it."

Since everyone is guilty...what purpose does the guilt really serve?

Well that's just funny. I would like an explanation of the guilt-o-meter. Is the 0-9 is how guilty they felt on a scale of zero to nine?

Rob4Hope wrote: ↑Fri May 12, 2017 2:01 pm Since everyone is guilty...what purpose does the guilt really serve?

If you create a fake illness, along with a fake cure, and you are able to convince people that the cure will actually work, e-v-e-n-t-u-a-l-l-y... You can use the constant guilt to sell them the fake cure, and since they believe that the cure might work eventually, they keep paying, and coming back. Many people keep doing it until they die.

(Religion in a nut-shell. It works with more than just sexual "sins". )

How did he determine "degree of guilt?" Did he check heart rate elevation, or use a kind of cold reading method when the questions were asked? There's no link to explain the method of data collection (or if there is, I'm blind as a bat).

OK....well,....here is something that BLEW ME AWAY years ago.

Was in a bishop's office talking casually about I have no memory of it. I mentioned that there sure seems to be an increase of porn problems with some of the young men. Bishop, in a moment of candor that was probably inappropriate mentioned that the problem was escalating seriously with the young women getting into it.

WTF!!!!?????

Young women don't do that!......what was he talking about!.......

It still blows me away the massive LDS premadonna culture about YW being non-sexual people UNTIL they automagically change when the "officiator at the alter" pronounces them "husband and wife for eternity". Somehow, they just become sexual creatures....but before that?....just pure.

What a joke. The guilt culture doesn't even acknowledge woman as having feelings in the "spectrum" presented. I wonder what statistics would look like for just the women of various religious groups......alone.

Mad Jax wrote: ↑Fri May 12, 2017 5:33 pm How did he determine "degree of guilt?" Did he check heart rate elevation, or use a kind of cold reading method when the questions were asked? There's no link to explain the method of data collection (or if there is, I'm blind as a bat).

You're right I didn't include a link to the study. I'll look for that. I'm pretty sure it was self reported on a questionnaire. That's how they kept it anonymous to ensure unpressured, reliable answers.

wtfluff wrote: ↑Fri May 12, 2017 4:13 pm

Rob4Hope wrote: ↑Fri May 12, 2017 2:01 pm Since everyone is guilty...what purpose does the guilt really serve?

If you create a fake illness, along with a fake cure, and you are able to convince people that the cure will actually work, e-v-e-n-t-u-a-l-l-y... You can use the constant guilt to sell them the fake cure, and since they believe that the cure might work eventually, they keep paying, and coming back. Many people keep doing it until they die.

(Religion in a nut-shell. It works with more than just sexual "sins". )

Yup, control.

I'm not sure how the sex act scale really relates to Mormons. The scale is not just Mormons, but all religious. 84% have had intercourse. Not sure how recent this is. For Mormons, most were married around 21, especially the women. The guilt scale seems accurate. Mormons shoulder the most guilt thanks to our wonderful leaders.

Perhaps for some religion has no effect on sexual activity, but I can assure you it did for me and my peers when we were young. We all wanted sex bad, and I mean bad, but the threat of eternal damnation never allowed us to cross that bridge.

Sex is what led me out of the church. I couldn't figure out the LDS perspective, because it sure did "F!" with my marriage in a horrible way. It was when I started a deep dive and began reading what I could on the topic from the LDS perspective I found out just how messed up there were.

The church will have a leader say something that does damage--and they then don't correct it but just led it fizzle out with non-talk over a period of years. But the damage is done. And it makes no sense from the position of the church either.

Anyone remember a talk years ago about an ax wedge or something laid against a tree and never moved? The tree grew around it, and years later when a strong storm came through, the tree broke and ripped apart at that very place. The owner discovered the wedge still inside. This was one of those talks where an object lesson was drawn.

The church has a VERY big policy of "do what I say when I say", and not "do what I do". And they ignore, cherry pick, and even practice mixed standards with their own doctrine. Sex is one where they have done this: you have old-white-men from the "good old days"...men like Joseph Fielding Smith, Harold B. Lee, Spencer Kimball, and others, who openly taught things that got right into the bedroom (setting the wedge), and then you have new guys like Bednar who come across as so holy and sh!t (and others) who just hit the "thou shalt not"...and the wedge is left as part of the whole deal.

When the tree rips apart, where is the accountability?

The lack of accountability is the # 1 problem I currently have with the church.